Is That Blood!
by EatCrow
Summary: For a prompt on my Tumblr, submitted by Anonymous: Jasonette first meeting, please?-...- Also a fill for: "You just snuck into my apartment and wait is that blood?"-(Completed one-shot)


I've written a couple Jasonette first meetings already but I was scrolling through a prompt list and -You just snuck into my apartment and wait is that blood-stuck out to me. Hope you enjoy!

**This fic was beta-read by the lovely ****the17thtearoom on Tumblr!**

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Kwami knows that Marinette is a scatter-brained mess no matter what time of day it is. She would like to deny it, but really, no one would believe her. She blames Tikki, even if she was a disaster before the little fortune god came into her life. Nino has the proof, and has justly been sworn to silence.

There is never a need to relive the fourth grade. _Never_.

There's a general swirl of chaos that follows Marinette wherever she goes: Paris, London, New York, now Gotham. It's one of the reasons, maybe even the _reason_ that despite desperately needing someone around to help out with the rent—Gotham charged way too much for a studio apartment, how the hell is it _more expensive_ than Manhattan—she's never looked for a roommate. Not after spending a month bunking with Alya, and driving the girl insane.

Alya hadn't been the one to ask her to leave, she'd claimed Marinette was _fine_. Marinette had seen the way her eye twitched after the fourth time, in a week's span, she had come home tracking some dark, vaguely sticky substance behind her.

For the sake of their friendship, Marinette had moved out a little over a week later.

With this in mind, Marinette thinks she's being overwhelmingly okay with the situation when her first question, upon stepping foot back into her apartment, happens to be, "Is that blood?"

Not, "how did you get in here", or "who are you?" Is that blood? When did her life get this weird? Oh yeah, when she—a newly turned fourteen-year-old girl—was entrusted with guardianship over some of the most powerful deities in creation. That's when.

It's only after watching the man for an uncomfortable amount of time that Marinette notices the sickly crackling of unnatural magic clinging to the air around him. There's a pool of dark magic sitting in her living room. It's coating him, clinging to his very being and dripping, toxic, onto the pale beige carpeting.

God the carpeting, blood stains are a bitch to get out. At least he had the sense to push back the coffee table, and not sit on the couch that Marinette's fairly sure, has been in this apartment since _before_ she was born.

The stranger pauses his stitching mid-action, needle freezing halfway through the gash on his leg. Marinette is _concerned_.

"No, it's cranberry juice," he says sarcastically, even as he presses a towel, her pink bunny towel no less, against his leg. It's clearly an attempt to hide the murder scene she just walked in on, but honestly, the towel is turning a disgusting shade of rusty brown.

Marinette takes one fortifying look around her living room, paying particular attention to the sticky wet spot her home invader is sitting in. He had better not have touched her one true love. If the coffee maker is broken she will break him.

"You should finish stitching that up before you bleed to death all over my carpet."

"I'm not going to bleed out in the middle of your living room."

Marinette grabs her emergency first aid kit, the one she keeps tucked safely in the umbrella stand. It's a beast, and maybe Marinette had been a little obsessive when it came to putting it together, but she had spent a good portion of her life fighting. She liked to be prepared, even if being prepared meant carrying around a walking pharmacy.

Delicately, Marinette did her best to avoid mashing the blood further into the carpet. "I have a tourniquet in here just in case, but it doesn't look like we need it. You did remember to disinfect the cut before you started stitching, right?"

She's close enough now, knelt next to the man, to really make out his features. The pressure she forces down on the wound makes him wince, and Marinette blinks. Green eyes, there's an aura to them that reminds Marinette distinctly of Tikki's magic, a faint light just barely visible—Lazarus light. Well, that explained the corruption clinging to the air.

"I didn't think you would be too thrilled with me poking around your bathroom," he hisses out, sharp and very clearly in pain.

Marinette would usually let a lie like that go, but her patience is getting dangerously thin. "You could have spent another minute grabbing the peroxide from the medicine cabinet. It's not like I can't see you're bloody footprints marking your trail. You grabbed my favorite towel, but not the one thing that prevents a staph infection. Who taught you first aid? _Honestly!_ "

A dark brow raises upward, clear interest taking over the strangers face. "You're remarkably calm for someone who just found a random stranger dripping blood all over their apartment."

"I'm more than a little pissed over that. You owe me a carpet cleaning." Marinette grabs the travel-sized bottle of peroxide out of her kit, along with her sterilized needle, lighter, actual stitching thread—why the fuck is he using dental floss? _Why?_—and a roll of gauze. She'll probably need more later, but for now, this is good. "You're giving yourself way too much credit. This isn't even close to the strangest thing I've seen this week. Now, this is going to sting like a bitch, but you broke into my apartment so, you deserve it."

He lets out a long string of curses, biting down hard on his hand as Marinette pours the disinfectant over the wound. It's a good three inches long and at least a centimeter deep. He needs a hospital but, seeing as his first choice was breaking and entering, Marinette's probably as close to a professional as he'll see.

"Fucking shit," he grounds out around clenched teeth. Marinette has to take out the stitches he's already done. They're uneven and sloppy, probably because he'd been using the needle from her sewing kit. She slips her surgical scissors, the fresh pair she just held under her lighter, against the floss. His face loses all color as she carefully works the four rows he made out. "I know you're pissed, but I don't deserve this."

Marinette casts him her most deadpan expression as she lights the curved stitching needle on fire. "Who's the dumbass who didn't disinfect his—what? Stab wound? It looks like a stab wound, do you have any idea where that knife could have been? You're lucky I'm nice enough not to let you get a blood infection."

A smirk tugs at the corner of his lips. "Nice enough. You're a regular ray of sunshine, aren't you?"

"You're the one who broke in." Marinette takes satisfaction in stabbing her needle into the skin and watching as his smirk turns into a grimace. "How did you get in here anyway? The front door was still locked."

"I kicked in the back door," he admits, with just the faintest hint of shame. "It was hanging on by a bolt and a decades worth of rust."

"You're _lucky_ you're already bleeding."

"I was in a hurry, okay," he says defensively. "My friend lives in the same apartment number one complex over. I apparently was off a bit with my directions. I promise, I don't usually break into random people's homes."

"Guess I'm just special then." Marinette has to hide her smile by occupying herself with cleaning up. She's angry at him, damn it!

"I'll fix the door for you if you want? And I'll pay for one of those rug doctors Walmart rents." He carefully stretches out his leg. He's a bit unsteady on his feet. A mix between pain and blood loss no doubt. Wordlessly she offers up a bottle of Tylenol.

She regrets handing it to him a _nanosecond_ later when he takes a double dose and then, throws back a third for good measure.

"Oh, you're going to be paying my cleaning bill all right, but the door can wait," Marinette says, getting up, and heading over to her kitchen. There is no problem in the world food doesn't make better. "You look like you could really use some breakfast, and I've had nowhere near my daily dose of caffeine. We can figure everything out after we've eaten."

The man follows her over, leaning heavily against the wall to support his weight. It's a sorry sight. He makes an aborted move to help her before deciding that _nope_, he really can't stand for all that long. "Did I tell you how weird you are yet? I feel like I should have."

"Would you rather I call the cops and kick you out?" Marinette asks, pushing the coffee maker to the very edge of the counter. He can reach it if he tries. Marinette fully plans to _make_ him. With a bit more force than necessary, she slams down her jar of coffee mix. "Clearly you're lucid enough to make some coffee while I fry up some eggs."

There's a spark of amusement in the stranger's eyes. His smirk is back, and he watches Marinette with something like glee. "Sure thing, firefly."

"It's Marinette," she corrects, not bothering to turn away from the stove. "Marinette Dupain-Cheng. I'd say it's nice to meet you but...you did break into my house."

"That's fair," the stranger agrees. Reaching for her phone instead of the stack of coffee filters. The bastard, doesn't he realize how _thin_ her sanity is stretching? "Jason Todd. You mind if I use your phone for a minute. Roy can stop by Home Depot, and get you a new door. So we won't be reinstalling something that was already on its last legs."

Marinette feels a headache coming on. "I'll make enough for three then. Just have him pick up some kind of cleaner so the stain doesn't set in."


End file.
